No Getting Off This Ride
by Chyme for the Rhyme
Summary: Ever since their second clash against each other at Ground Beta, things had been different between them. Katsuki had sworn as much. Still though. It didn't prevent Izuku from tugging at Katsuki's nerves all the time, like a dog on a leash. And in all honesty? It made him want to hurl. {For BakuDeku positivity week 2018 Day 3 (18/9) - Worth - Winter Hero Costume - Vigilante}
1. Rumination

**Notes:** Day 3 (18/9) - Worth Winter Hero Costume Vigilante

Including a cameo by Hamimawari Koichi from 'Vigilante: Boku no Hero Academia Illegals' manga.

* * *

It annoyed Katsuki sometimes, just how easy it was for the nerd to dart into his line of sight. Sometimes even just a waver of nervous breath, or the weird clap of sound he heard, whenever Deku cupped his mouth with his fingers as he was about to embark on another muttering spiel, was enough to catch at his attention. It made him want to hurl.

'Kacchan!'

But what was even worse, was when Deku tried to catch at _his._ And with such a goddamn cheerful tone as well.

But he weathered it as he always did. And even though he knew now, that Izuku wasn't secretly laughing at him when he told Katsuki that _oh, your winter costume's so great, simply because you used your head and came up with an idea any idiot could come up with! More cloth +less bared skin =more sweat for explosions!_

Yeah, no kidding, Deku. _Genius._

…

Yeah, yeah, he got it. Deku was being nice and peachy keen, and it turned out his words had never been as barbed and veiled with sarcasm the way Katsuki always thought they had been. Deku wasn't the great sinister actor, with his shining eyes and words of praise, that Katsuki had wanted him to be, if only to justify all the shit he'd given Deku over the years. No, turned out the joke's on him, as it always tended to be since coming to UA. Should have known. Deku was Deku. Sucked at anything that required being something more than a nerd. As an actor, he _sucked,_ and as a liar he _stank_ ; shitty nerd couldn't even keep his mouth shut about the quirk he got from All Might to the one person who would have been happy to beat the idiocy out from him. And damn did, too.

It didn't mean it wasn't hard though. To refrain from the lightning pulse of fury that seized hold of him and made his eyes bulge whenever Deku dared to speak. Dared to be nice. To him.

I DON'T WANT IT! STOP IT! His mind screamed, even as it was aware of the parallel, of Deku trembling before him throughout the years, yelling in his quivering, scaredy-cat voice for Kacchan to STOP IT too.

Damnit. The joke really was on him.

'STOP PRAISING ME, DAMNIT!' he near howled now, teeth grinding at the sound of _that_ voice. If he could have swallowed down Deku's words and spat them right back out at the nerd, he would've done it. Would've grinned to see them leave a mark too.

But Deku just smiled at him, un-phased, even if there was a slight, wry twitch to his smile, a little tired gleam to his eyes that seemed to speak all on their own and say _aaaah, same old Kacchan._ It made Katsuki fucking furious.

He spun round, despite the itch between his should blades, the same jumping, driving need to spin and give Deku the fright of his life. He had some class B extras to fight, and grind down beneath his heel. And maybe then, the suffocation he felt around that scummy nerd would go away.

* * *

Weeks later, and Katsuki was beginning to feel like he could breathe again. He had a provisional license to his name, and could now let heat dance in his palms in public without having to worry about being arrested. Best of all, he was paired up for battle practise with some woman in a bunny-like outfit who didn't want to hit on him the way Pixie-Bob had, or make weird faces at him the way Midnight sometimes did. In fact she seemed far more interested in hitting other people.

'C'mon on, Sparky,' she taunted, her long hair artfully whipped out of her face by the force of the kick she sent spiraling into Katsuki's gut. 'PUT SOME MUSCLE BEHIND IT!'

This cry fell into Katsuki's ears and pounded into his head as he rolled over and over, grit shoved into his teeth, as his hands slammed out to cushion his fall with a blast of orange heat. She was no All Might, but then who was? Besides she didn't have to stick her arms out to save herself from a nasty fall the way he did; most of the time her hare-like legs could absorb the impact of the nearest hard surface and have her bounce off the ground or wall like a freakin' bunny. Kind of like Deku.

The thought pissed him off, and deciding to throw caution to the wind (he wasn't at fast as her, but then again, standing still and waiting for her to kick out at him again was just plain dumb) he ran forward to greet the whirlwind of limbs that she became whenever he was within striking distance. Long range blasts did nothing; she was too quick to be caught, at least at his current level, but if he could fire off a quick shot within skin-grazing distance? Well. All bunnies hated to get their fur burnt, right?

He grinned. 'C'mon on, rabbit,' he said lowly.

Something flashed in her eyes and she came at him hard and fast in response; but this time Katsuki managed to avert disaster by ferrying two quick rapid blasts at her face and legs simultaneously, leaving her to duck and weave into a rushed jump, her body braced by the waves of heat either side. Spinning in midair, and forced into a narrow margin of fire-free space, she came hurtling towards him feet first in a rocket-like propulsion. He grinned, slammed the open hollow of his fingers and thumb into his other open palm and ran his tongue over his teeth in anticipation. The curled shape allowed his next explosion to come out as a stream of quick-fire dots, bullets that barrelled into the sole of her incoming foot.

She promptly spat out a curse his mother would be proud of, and swung round, face set in a heavy scowl of pain as she dragged her foot through the dust to wrestle the burns into more presentable bruises. Simultaneously her arm swung up from underneath as she spun round to rake it way across his chin into a harsh uppercut.

Katsuki only managed to dodge part-way, his own arms climbing round the thick muscle of her bicep as he fell, his legs shoving him forward in order to get in close, hopefully close enough to affect her usual pivoting steps and to narrow the scope of her kicks. Up close, _too_ close, and she could drive him away with as much force as before. Besides, up close and personal, he could make her burn.

'Die,' he half-whispered, half-growled, drunk on the idea of victory, before she promptly punched his jaw.

'Kacchan!' he heard Deku shriek in the background, like the goddamn girl character in the 'All-Mighty Dukedom' cartoon they had watched together a decade back.

He grit his teeth, moments before his back hit the ground. _Stay out of this, or I'll kill you_ , he thought savagely at the nerd, not even having the time to spit it out. Because Damn Bunny Woman and her hoppity steps-

She kicked him aside, bouncing away in a manner so reminiscent of Deku and his stupid Shoot-Style that Katsuki spent the next few minutes incredibly focused on stopping her movements or at least hindering her. He wanted to win, but he wasn't dumb. He knew he wasn't quite there yet; she was no.5 for a reason.

Four minutes later, he was on the floor, bruises clambering their way over his arms beneath the thick black material; or so it felt like. All of him hurt and was sore, and to make matters worse, Deku was hovering over him like a bothersome fly that just wouldn't take a hint.

'Kacchan, that was really cool the way you aimed your blast to try and make her hair fall in her face like that!' he exclaimed, attempting to unsuccessfully push a bottle of water into Katsuki's hand. Katsuki merely grunted and let his hand flop off the curve of the plastic, too tired to swat away Deku's offending fingers.

'Don't need your damn charity,' he spat out with fire none the less, utterly unsurprised to see Deku shoot him an exasperated look in return.

'You need fluids, Kacchan,' he said firmly. 'You're sweating even more because of your winter costume, after all; you don't want to get dehydrated.'

'I'll rather lick sweat off a dog than-'

Katsuki was cut off with an ill-timed snarling grunt as Miruko unpeeled his back from the charred tile of her indoor gym, with just her metal-plated foot. It was like the damn thing was a spatula. One Katsuki did not appreciate.

'Oi,' he barked out, only to be greeted by an ominous grin in his direction. One that widened as he bared his own teeth at her.

He ignored the sound of Deku muttering 'Uwah, such a scary combination,' as she stared him down.

'You wanna faint, brat? Go ahead. I could do with a new cushion.'

Katsuki twisted his face even more. What was it with pro hero women and their need to fuck with underage-

'No,' Miss Thumper said, almost leering at him now, and not with the sexual kind of fervor Katsuki had thought of accusing her of, but with the battle-crazy lust he had felt flooding his system his whole life. 'Make that a door-mat. Perfect for wiping my dirty feet with. You don't even deserve to be a cushion I could pummel with my fists, if you don't even have what it takes to keep yourself alive.'

She ripped the bottle from Deku's hands, twisted the top off with a crack and damn-near slammed the thing down his throat like it was a basketball and Katsuki's mouth the hoop.

And Deku for his part, damn near started hyperventilating at the sight, his hands whirling and spreading like a fan in a panicked flurry of motion, and Katsuki just wanted to bite at him, snarl out at him to quit worrying and-

Damn Miss Thumper seized the back of Deku's stupid jumpsuit with a sly curl of her fingers.

'Your turn!' she announced with a wild grin.

And Katsuki abruptly relaxed, his own grin lazy and mellow as Deku panicked even further.

* * *

'Aaaah,' said the nerd sixteen minutes later in the street outside, hair dusty and streaked with dried sweat. 'I really need a shower.'

Katsuki snorted, and rapidly set the pace, taking a grim satisfaction in the way he heard Dkeu's panicky steps behind him race to catch up. 'You need a lot of things,' he said shortly. 'Like my fist in your face to make you quit yapping.'

Deku, the sly fucker, gave a world-weary sigh and, when Kacchan whipped his head round to shoot him a furious glower, he was met with a look that spoke of a bone-aching tiredness. 'Don't you want a shower too, Kacchan?' the loser asked. 'You must feel as gross as I do.'

'Don't lump me in with you, nerd.' Katsuki informed him briskly, marching off even further into the wide, open space of the street. 'I can last until we get back to the dorms. I don't have to go bitching and moaning about the sweat in my crack to every sorry fucker that comes along.'

Deku went quiet at that, his thumbs in their long white gloves, twitching and pressing together, almost twirling above the open slot of space the curve between his fingers and palm opened up. Katsuki, never slowing his pace for an instant, not even to turn his head, let an eye linger on the streams of green poking out beneath each finger. He observed the way they seemed to seep out beneath the white to cover the entire underside of the glove, spreading across the palm with a rich turquoise colour.

The new two-tone colour design didn't surprise him. Deku had always been such a fucking copycat. Besides, two-toned gloves looked badass and honestly, the thought of Deku imitating him in any fashion, while still annoying, didn't make him feel nearly as wrathful as it once did. He couldn't fault Deku for having the sense to try and improve his shoddy fashion sense, for one thing.

'You tryin' out a new look or sumthing?' he asking, jerking a quick nod to those two-toned coloured hands and the nervous fingers they covered.

Deku looked up, a quick look of surprise flashing over his face before he softened and looked down again, a nervous smile now perched on his face. Katsuki felt something a little like regret slice into him as his… ** _rival_** spoke. 'Ah…you noticed! Yeah, the design may look bulky but it actually reinforces…'

Katsuki spend the next two minutes grunting and looking away disinterestedly while carefully absorbing and analysing every word. 'Huh,' he said after Deku had finally finished waxing poetically about something he should have come up with months ago. 'You're basically trying to turn your hands into guns, so you don't havta worry about turning them into boneless mush.'

Deku smiled and mimed flicking the street in front of him. 'That's right! They help focus the blast of force I can channel down my finger with pin-point accuracity! It's not quite a 'smash' but maybe…a sniper-like 'bang' instead!'

Katsuki grinned. 'Whatever. You'll never be on my level with whimpy shots like that.'

Deku smiled, almost privately. It was strange; not the sort of smile Katsuki was used to seeing on him. And he'd paid a lot more attention to Deku's stupid facial expressions over the years than he probably should have. 'Ah. I'll rise above that, Kacchan, just you wait and see!'

Deku's optimism was a funny thing. It hadn't been present for years, at least not so openly. But receiving a killer quirk and letting his nerdy brain turn sly like a fox, to come up with strategies for handling something that put him in the hospital every time he used it, had forced him to grow up in a way Katsuki had always tried to stunt. And Katsuki wasn't quite sure how to feel about that. Mostly angry though. Because maybe a part of him had missed this, seeing Deku so happy and at home in himself. It was an uncomfortable thought.

And then suddenly, there was a scream, and all of a sudden, Katsuki felt a hell of a lot more comfortable. Deku had already sprung past him, smile wiped off his face as his eyes grimly homed in on a girl crouched beside a hair dressing salon, her hands slammed down round her skirt as though to keep it plastered round her skin.

'Miss,' he called out, already attempting to fix his face into a reassuring smile, though to Katsuki's eyes he just looked demented. 'What's wrong?'

But Katsuki's eyes had already moved on, locked and fixed onto the slim, squatted shape of something that flew by close to the ground, long and dark, rolling down the street and turning the corner as though stray stones and cracks could do nothing to hinder its movement. And. Well. Let Deku comfort the cringing victim. And long as she wasn't about to fall over dead, he would be all too happy to-

'The pervert peeked up my skirt!' she wailed. 'And then he-'

So he was Grapehead's sliding-snake cousin, got it. Katsuki raced down the street. And okay, so the fucker may not have hurt anyone, and peeking, so to speak, wasn't a jail-worthy crime. But still. That fucker was dead. Burnt and roasted to crisp. Set alight and shot into the sky. With a cackle, Katsuki shot up into the air, over a slim storefront wedged between two apartments, explosions crackling beneath his palms with force as he was granted a bird-eye's view of the area. Then he twisted, timed his explosions to let him fall into the right direction, and he was off, rapidly gaining on the creeper who swerved round a wobbly bike and halted, just in time for the fucker to raise both arms…

\- and catch the little boy who was busy falling prey to gravity, sailing off out of his seat towards the harsh bite of tarmac below.

'You alright?' the toady-faced bastard asked the wailing brat, after they had both slammed into the road. 'Easy there, you're alright, see?'

Katsuki let out a harsh 'tch' and rolled to the ground. How was he supposed to punch the daylights out of someone when they had a wailing kid in their arms?

'Kacchan, wait!'

Katsuki barely spared the nerd a glance as he stalked towards the creep who was attempting to pacify the kid with a bunch of Pokemon plasters he was dragging out of his lame All Might hoodie. A hoodie Deku looked close to drooling all over, his wide eyes eagerly tracing over the blue and yellow diagonal cuts of material.

'Wow,' he said in a hushed voice tinged with awe. 'That's sixth edition version of the-'

 _Oh no_ , that nerd _didn't._

'Oi,' Katsuki grit out, taking satisfaction in the way the low-life turned an unhealthy white upon glancing up into his face. 'You the pervert that likes sneaking a peek up women's skirts?' He let a familiar crackle of orange play out in his palm just for the intimation factor and was pleased to see sweat springing to the brow of the other guy.

'No, no, I don't care what the statistics say, I've never-'

'Kacchan,' Deku hissed, actually having the gall to grab his arm before Katsuki had the time to do anything helpful with it, like lowering his explosion-generating palm into the creeper's face. 'He's the Hauler.'

The guy below them immediately let out a groan, releasing the kid to rub a tired hand against his face. 'It's the Crawler,' he said to no one in particular. 'I just…I don't understand why that's hard for people to remember.'

Deku must have had a death wish or something, because he immediately looked horrified as though he had a right to feel concern for the guy's hurt feelings. 'Oh! Oh! That does make more sense, actually, I'm sorry!' His head then whipped back to Katsuki, so caught up in his dorky self, that he failed to be significantly cowered by the glare Katsuki was currently blasting him with. Katsuki promptly tried to glare harder. 'Kacchan! He's a vigilante along with Knuckleduster! He's seen frequently working with him to take out the victims of the Trigger drug while the public idol Pop Step takes on a sort of look-out role! I mean, I know he's not a pro-hero-

'That's right,' Katsuki drawled loudly, abruptly shaking Deku off his arm with a singular hard thrust of his shoulder blade. 'He's not.' He glowered down at the Crawler head-case, hands on hips. Why the hell was the nerd going all starry-eyed over this freak? Wasn't it heroes and quirks that Deku had such a weird hard-on for? Oh…

Katsuki rolled his eyes up to the heavens.

'You have some weird quirk that keeps you close to the ground, don't cha?' he said, feeling dismay weigh down on him. Damnit…he had really been looking forward to ramming some punk's teeth down his throat, now that he legally could. 'That's why that woman was so up in arms about you getting an eyeful of her underwear or whatever. Tch.'

Deku laughed, hair twisting itself up into the knots of his curly bush of a mop as he did that typical I'm-unsure-of-myself-and-need-something-to-hold-onto-in-the-face-of-my-uncertainty move that he hadn't grown out of since he was four. It was pathetic. 'Actually…she admitted that he gave her back some photos she had taken at a booth that had slipped out of her hand,' he admitted, with a shy smile. 'I guess she just jumped to conclusions.'

Katsuki was surrounded by such morons that it wasn't even funny. Actually, it never had been funny. Full. Stop.

He quickly bit back whatever irritation he felt at the fact that Deku had done the right thing in actually stopping to listen to the wailing girl who was too paranoid for her own good, and squared his shoulders, raking his eyes over the other Deku-wannabe. Honestly. If Deku has been born with a quirk, one too weak to help him pass a hero exam, would he have ended up like this guy, constantly crawling on the ground and taking everybody's else shit?

Katsuki growled. He thought he knew the answer to that question, and it sent a searing, sharp rage through him, like a knife.

'Get out of here,' he barked at the lame idiot before him, who had probably woken up too late to go to a proper hero exam when he left middle school or something. Why else would he be gliding round in an All Might hoodie nowadays? 'Before I kill you,' he finished off menacingly, cracking his knuckles together.

Deku looked at him with such a judging look, that Katsuki felt his face twitch, his lip jutting out to push his snarl into an even uglier shape. Meanwhile the other idiot, the one on the ground, blinked up at him. 'Alright,' he said, shooting a glance at the kid who had now been reduced to sniffles instead of wails. 'You okay? You know you should really stay on the pavement next time…'

Katsuki curled his hand into a fist. How dare that jerk ignore him! Then the jerk raised his eyes to Katsuki again, a rather steady look within him that Katsuki didn't like one bit.

'You should give Makoto Tsukauchi a call, one day, if you ever need some publicity ideas for your hero image,' he said to Katsuki with the same sort of well-meaning smile Deku had often aimed in his direction. 'She has some…interesting ideas.' His lips twitched as though he had thought up something 'interesting' himself, but before Katsuki could kill him for real, the guy placed his hands flat on the ground, bent his leg at an ankle and was suddenly whizzing off like a human greyhound. No, not a greyhound, he amended in his head, this bastard was more like a long, lean, _puny_ insect that skated over the water, practically weightless. He hoped someone fly-swatted the bastard.

Unfortunately Deku didn't share his distaste.

'Such a cool quirk,' he was whispering to himself like a complete nutter, as he crouched down to make sure the now red-eyed child was okay. 'I wonder if he had to have all the fingers of his hands on the ground to activate it kind of like how Uraraka has to bring her hands together to release objects under the effect of her quirk…'

Katsuki twitched. 'Oi. Why are you so focused on someone who's breaking the damn law!'

The nerd looked up him, blinking owlishly as though he had no damn idea what he'd done wrong. And honestly, Katsuki wasn't sure if there was any point trying. Words, snarls, fists; none of that had any impact on Deku. Not when it came to his delusions.

'He's helping people,' the nerd now had the nerve to say, though he kept his eyes from Katsuki's as he did so. He carefully propped the bike up on the road again, smiling slightly as the child stubbornly shook his head and refused to get on. 'I know he's doing something…illegal, but he's also doing things a lot of pro heroes wouldn't really do either, like picking up items people have dropped. I think that's a really-'

'Dumb, illegal thing to do,' stressed Katsuki, finally losing his patience and grabbing the bike by the handlebars, before yanking it rather aggressively to the side of the road. 'Oi kid, wear a helmet, next time,' he snarled, stalking off quickly so he wouldn't be forced to hear Deku babble and apologise for something he didn't cause.

He scowled at the road, fighting the urge to kick at the pavement tiles nearby. He hated this, this feeling of being pissed at Deku turning his eyes elsewhere, getting enthralled by something that had nothing to do with his goal.

'Kacchan!'

The name made his shoulders hunch, his glare worsen. And still he let Deku run up beside him, and pant a wet, 'our break's almost over,' into his ear.

Katsuki glanced up, at the slim strip of blue ahead, the thin pillar of sky suspended by the tall buildings that shrank next to its colour. The breeze whispered across his face, tugged at his head, and he waited for it to pass, before he turned round.

He grunted, and started walking back, still angry, but calmer somewhat. And if Deku kept sneaking anxious peeks at him, as though waiting for his approval. Well, tough. The nerd could wait for eternity to pass if that was the case.

Still, though, something eased in his gut at the sight.

* * *

'Heroes who form teams are sissies,' the Bunny Woman told them self-importantly, five minutes later. 'Honestly, the only time you should work together is when there's some bad guy who really needs to be taken down. But other than that? Nu-uh. What kind of coward wants to share a ranking with someone?'

Katsuki hadn't sniffed, or glowered, just remained standing, arms crossed, with a slight jut to his jawline. Privately, he agreed with her, at least in terms of ranking. On the other hand, some hero teams functioned better the way they were, mostly because they were focused on specialised work, like the Wild Pussycats did with mountain rescues and avalanches. For such a grueling task, one that often stretched out over hours, rather than a simple battle with a villain that could last seconds, teamwork was an essential component.

The shit nerd must have had the same thought, as he frowned. But he didn't say anything. Unusual.

'You know why I got you two?' rabbit woman asked unexpectedly. 'Because I was pushy. I stormed in and ask for the two most destructive kids they could give me, ones who wouldn't complain after an odd bruise or two. You won't get that on a team. You're expected to play way too nice with each other.'

Deku frowned again. And finally opened his mouth. 'Um,' he said.

 _Wonderful,_ thought Katsuki. _Here it comes_

'But isn't it easier for heroes who work in teams to get decent practise in battle scenarios?' Deku continued, a familiar stubborn light in his eyes. 'They can arrange practise sessions with each other much more easily, than opposing heroes can with their usual schedule clashes.'

Miruko stared at him, then grinned, slow and small. 'You're cockier than you look, with that wimpy face of yours, yeah? Good. Aizawa wasn't screwing me around.'

Katsuki would remember that moment fondly, just for the gobsmacked look on Deku's face. And the pained one, later on, when Rabbit Woman made them go through another dose of battle training, because that smart remark had got her 'all pumped up.' Though honestly? Katsuki could relate. Many of the things Deku said or did cut under his skin in a way few other people could manage.

And later than night, he found himself running through them all, all those faces and words Deku would make and what that awoke in him. From that angry, determined face the nerd wore when Rabbit Woman kept kicking him to the floor, to the way blood had smarted his forehead, dripping down to the floor when he ended up ramming himself into a wall, and the weird sense of 'huh' Katsuki had felt upon seeing it. He would remember the fright that seared that damn nerd's quavering voice too, as Katsuki had rolled across the floor for the third time in a row minute later, and he would remember the softness in the other boy's eyes, and that same trembling glimmer in them that still _would not die_ after all those years, no matter what Katsuki snarled at him.

Katsuki would remember the way Deku had been close that morning, as he had attempted to roll the bottle of water into Katsuki's hand, and how close he had been to him, crouched down, his thighs coated with the heavy black tread of armour that helped him crush rocks without shattering his femur. They would make for the world's most uncomfortable lap pillow, bumps and rubbery ravines digging gorges into your cheek. Then, at least, Katsuki wouldn't be the only one who could kill with his knees anymore.

Katsuki snorted at the thought, unamused at himself and turned over, dragging his blanket more firmly over his hip. Hopefully whatever else he dreamed up about Deku wouldn't have him muffling his screams into his pillow the way a select few had done in the past.

Maybe one day the nerd wouldn't haunt him, wouldn't burrow so far down into his thoughts, that it would actually be a surprise when he eventually cropped up in them. Katsuki could hope. And he could dream. But he suspected the joke would still be on him.

* * *

Katsuki didn't know how to feel a few days later, when he saw Deku wrap some of that expensive Golden Tips Imperial tea or whatever else that creation girl liked to sip out of her dainty cups, inside a bento box and sneak out of the dorms. But the scumbag had a shifty look on his face, one Katsuki had always felt wary of, with that deep frown dragging his big eyes into something small and downright villain-like, so, listening to his usual urges, Katsuki followed.

It was a stupid-ass decision. It was a creepy decision. It was a **Deku** -like decision. Katsuki mentally kicked himself all the way to the train station, hunching his shoulders and slinking into the compartment directly behind the one Deku's red-booted feet sent him tripping inside. Never, would he have thought the day would come when he'd transform into an actual stalker like Deku. How the nerd had dragged him down.

He watched Deku through the door that linked their carriages, keeping his head low, watching as the nerd glanced down at his bento box with a troubled look on his face and a familiar mutter on his lips. He bit back a smirk at the way other passengers gave him nervous glances and huddled away from him together, like bunch of penguins abandoning the sick one to the cold. The sight amused him long enough to keep the smirk on his face even after he followed Deku out to his chosen stop. In fact, he was downright cheerful by the time Deku had led him through a higgly-piggly set of streets and through a maze that must have worked out like the cross-hatch patterns on an artist's sketchbook. Old stores and run-down houses swept by their side as they walked, and Deku was too lost in himself to notice Katsuki and his quiet steps mere metres away behind him.

Katsuki only stopped, really, when Deku turned suddenly into a small, ramshackle yard, one that closed in round a local prison. He watched quietly as Deku sighed, steeled himself, and made his steps firmer, more decisive, almost a march as he walked up to the entrance. Katsuki felt no need to follow him further. He was curious, yes, but there were actual law enforcement people inside, and guards who might have licenses to use quirks of their own. He very much doubted that even Deku, with his magnetism for stupidity, could get himself caught up in the cross-hairs of a prison break-out. But he still stuck around to make sure. Half an hour passed. Katsuki leaned back against a bench, the wood made grainy and thin with splinters. And pretended to ignore the slight twitch in his gut when Deku rambled out, down the steps of the entrance again, a faint smile on his face.

He looked…relieved. Like whatever had been eating at him, and forcing frowns onto his face that morning had received a swift punch in the face for its troubles. In fact, his bento box was practically swinging from his hands, looking considerably lighter, as it did so.

Katsuki rose from the bench like a ghoul, his own strides quick and heavy, as he marched up to Deku, and bit out his name.

'Deku,' he said, low and biting, watching as the happy look on Deku's face instantly crashed and slipped away into something cautious. And Katsuki grimaced, fingers biting into his palm at the sight of it. It made him feel red-hot. Angry. But then that was nothing new.

'The hell are you doing here?' he asked as…non violently as he could. And perhaps the intention had slipped through into his voice as Deku merely glanced down for a moment. Then quickly raised his head to meet his eyes. 'Just visiting someone,' he answered.

Katsuki glared at him. Was he serious? Of course he was visiting someone! Why else would he come here? Was he taking the shit?!

Still. Katsuki had been trying now. And he was damned if he was gonna let Deku's shitty attitude hold him back and make him fail in his promise that 'things would be different now' after their fight at Ground Beta.

So Katsuki took a mental breath. And spared a look at the building beside him, at the pale yellow walls and the rust coating the thin bars over the window. The garden, what little there was of it, was run-down, green shoots peeling through cracks in the cement-covered yard, daises springing up ten-fold through whatever trace of soil could still break through.

'Someone, huh?' He stepped over, staggered even, into Deku's space. There was a few, scant inches between them and already Katsuki could feel the energy crackling between them as it always did. 'Last time I checked, your Dad was overseas, not locked up in a shithole like this.'

Deku bristled, just as Katsuki knew he would. 'You're not gonna let it go, huh, Kacchan?' He sighed, then offered up a weak frown. 'Okay. The festival's over, so it won't hurt anyone I guess, if you know…I came to visit someone I fought and helped lock away,' he admitted, irritation plain on his face. 'Alright? Someone I helped put here.' And out it stumbled, just as Katsuki knew it would; Deku had always been a motor-mouth when it came to him. He couldn't even keep the one secret he should have guarded with his life away from Katsuki's ears.

So he listened with mounting disbelief about that stupid viral video criminal Gentle, and how Deku had pounded him into the dirt. Because Deku hadn't felt obligated to leave it at that. Oh no, the mighty shit-head simply had to take it upon himself to visit the guy because the bloody tea they serve here _isn't to his liking_. Deku even had the gall to look guilty about it, like meeting the fucker for five minutes had been enough to earn a permanent place in his heart.

'Mostly it's just warm water,' Deku readily admitted, twiddling his thumbs. 'It's true; I've tasted it, it's disgusting, Kacchan.'

Katsuki looked at him, at the sun catching in his eyes, green as ever and yet so much more vivid than the slim stems fighting their way to life throughout the prison yard. Nothing about what he'd heard surprised him at all. But still. He couldn't understand it.

'You got nothing better to do than have tea with criminals?' he asked quietly, anger simmering on his tongue. 'Seriously, Deku? How're you gonna surpass me, with shit like this on your mind, holding you down?'

Deku looked at him, chubby cheeks alit with the sun, and with a strange certain faith in his eyes. He made Katsuki want to hate him, want to crush him with everything he had. Already the anger was rushing into his hand, making it bunch into a fist and tremble, like an earthquake had come to root in the tense rock of his muscles, to shake them loose. He could feel it, like a heartbeat constantly trapped in his wrist.

 **Izuku** was the fault-line, every single time.

'That's just it, Kacchan,' that same shitty nerd now said, with not even a smile to gentle his words. 'How can I be a hero if I don't help someone who genuinely wants to be 'better?'

* * *

Katsuki had always wanted to be better, no, the best, undisputed and unafraid. Even when the fear did come creeping in from all angles. Even when the stray thoughts about Deku, and the complicated knot of emotions regarding him reared their head.

Deku. The one who never stayed that way. Who dared to refuse to fade into the background and become an extra the way everyone else from middle school had done.

So then days later, when he dared to knock on Deku's door, and shove his way inside, all to drift closer to that boy who made him want to hurtle headfirst into the fucking moon, he would let it come out, that one stupid question that made him feel weak inside.

'Hey,' he would bite out, keeping the viciousness in his tone to a grueling hum. 'Whenever you're stupid enough to try and rescue me, **even when I don't need it** , does that mean you want to make me all 'better' too, like your Mr Gentle Tea-Drinker? Eh, Deku?'

And Izuku, much like the rabbit his costume sometimes painted him as, would freeze.

* * *

Just like Katsuki was now frozen, hours in the past. He was stuck in this stupid prison pathway, staring at Deku, who looked back at him defiantly, a glare in his eyes. The sun chose to fall over his hair in that moment, and like some stupid rom-com, or even an up-close professional photo shoot, it delicately picked out stray licks and crescent shapes within the curls there, all to paint them into a lighter hue. If Katsuki had a hint of a poetic bone in his body, he would have said they damn near glittered in contrast to the rest of that dark bush.

But he didn't. Think anything that was. He just stared. Refused to look away. Because he wouldn't be weak over anything, he _refused._

'Oh?' he asked, desperately slamming himself together to project the necessary amount of menace in his tone. 'You planning to make friends with all the future villains you take down? What a sound game plan.'

Deku's face twisted up and he damn near stomped his foot. Almost. 'That's not what I said at all! Kacchan, you're not listening to me!'

'No,' Katsuki bit out harshly. 'I heard you, alright. You wanna be a hero that saves everyone, right? Even the ones who pretend they want to be saved by you, only some of them might snap round to kill you dead, when you're busy sobbing and inviting them round for tea. You're gonna meet plenty of those types too.'

Deku gave him a very offended look. 'I'm not stupid, Kacchan!'

Yes, you are, you damn liar, Katsuki thought. You've always been stupid, ever since you were a little tyke trailing after me. Especially over the things that matter.

'I'm not going to believe every villain who tells me they want to be redeemed until I see them prove it with their actions!' Deku continued, fist clenched, as though that actually proved anything.

Katsuki snorted. 'This is pointless,' he muttered. 'You wanna rip your heart out for a bunch of strangers? Let them chew it to bits and spit it out, huh? Be my guest.' And then he had turned on his heel and stomped away.

And ignored the weird anger he felt, muted and almost frightened, when Deku failed to hurry after him.

* * *

He had been aware of course, of Deku's eyes on him. All his life, they had watched him, had scurried to the side, panicked, whenever he had caught them at it. Now though, that Deku had been around other people who had a quirk as great as Katsuki's, he wasn't quite as hyper focused on Katsuki's back as he had once been. Or maybe he was distracted by having actual friends this time round.

But it itched at him, at just how strongly Deku came round to clutch at the old connection between them. He could be cross with Katsuki, plenty of times sure, really angry if Katsuki pushed it. But it was all too easy for Deku to keep greeting him afterwards, to keep smiling at him, as though Katsuki had never attempted to tear it off him in the first place.

So a few days later, when Deku didn't keep shooting him harried, furtive looks, the way he might have done once, Katsuki found himself wrestling with an uncomfortable idea. And no matter how he dug his cheek into his pillow that night, his mind would not stay down. It would rear up and bark at him like an irritating dog.

Katsuki sighed and thumped the pillow, once, then twice for good measure, just to shut it up. 'Screw this,' he muttered angrily, getting up and shoving on his slippers with a ruthless efficacy. Out he stalked into the corridor, climbing down the levels until he found that sly Deku's room.

He proceeded to then stare at the door for five minutes, before sighing and rapping his knuckles sharply on the centre.

'Oi, get your ass up!'

He wasn't too surprised that he only needed to do it once more, before the door slowly swung inwards, away from his beating fist, just enough to reveal a large, wavering eye.

'Kacchan?' the partially revealed mouth asked beneath it.

Katsuki stared, unsurprised. 'Let me in before I kill you.'

The few stray curls of hair he could see rising above the thin strip of a face revealed before him seemed to stiffen. 'That's scary, Kacchan! Like something the bad guy in a horror movie would say!'

Katsuki's stare became a scowl. 'You saying I'm a bad guy, huh?'

That, more than anything seemed to make the nerd re-grow his spine, because the eye immediately narrowed and he stepped back to let the door swing open. 'What? No!'

'Good,' Katsuki muttered, as he swaggered in, gripping Deku by the wrist as the anxious nerd quickly pulled the door closed.

'Wait, Kacchan, what are you-'

''Bunny Woman was right,' Katsuki announced, as though he hadn't made the conversation take a swift turn. He felt Deku's eyes on him, wide and scared, just a little, as Katsuki towed him over to the bed. 'One of us in that training room would make a good pillow; but it sure as hell ain't me.'

He swung round, manhandled Deku onto the bed ( _hey, ow! Kacchan, what are you doing!?'_ ) and then dived down, spreading himself over the duvet and the graceless bumps of Deku' spayed out legs as they hung over the bed. Firmly he let his hand grasp the knee, tightening enough for Deku to wince, as he swung his head over him, staring down at Kacchan with a shell-shocked look.

'K-Kacchan! This-s—s is a-a-a-'

'Lap pillow' Katsuki intoned for him with a bored look, eyes fixed rigidly on the All Might poster in front of him. 'What's the matter? Too much of a baby still to say it properly?'

Deku reddened, fingers wavering above Katsuki's head like he didn't know what to do with them. Katsuki sighed. Honestly, it looked like he would have to teach Deku everything, huh?

He grasped one of Deku's hand and pulled it down, over the slim curve of his ear into the bustled spikes of his hair. 'Touch it already,' he growled. 'But no pulling, or you're dead.'

Deku squeaked. But after a few moments his fingers very hesitantly began to push through Katsuki's hair. As the seconds passed and Katsuki didn't suddenly swing round to sink his teeth into Deku's hand, he relaxed. His strokes became more confident. More calculated. He experimented, twisting and pressing down a little. Even began muttering a little.

Katsuki smiled, suitably smug. 'Hey,' he decided to break the ice with. 'Whenever you're stupid enough to try and rescue me, **even when I don't need it** , does that mean you want to make me all 'better' too, like your Mr Gentle Tea-Drinker? Eh, Deku?'

He felt Deku's fingers then, from where they had been gently stirring his hair, suddenly fall short, limp and afraid as they dropped into his neck like stones. And he turned, his grin half covered, dragged back by the bulge of Deku's thigh and the pull of his shorts, as they smothered the side of his face.

Deku, he knew, was by no means small and soft. But without the grip of his costume hugging his frame and the black casing he imprisoned his legs with, he was soft enough for Katsuki to rest his head inside the squat, shivering shape of his nervous, shaking lap.

Deku peered down at him, the shell-shocked look from when Katsuki had marched in, manhandled him to the bed and forced his head onto his knees , now abruptly fading away. In its place, something else emerged, another familiar look growing bold and bright, with a smile that was left soft and touched. Katsuki kind of wanted to pinch it away on principle.

'Cry on me, and I'll kill you,' he warned instead.

But Deku smiled. 'You're too tough to be phased by something like that; no way you'd drown.'

Katsuki thought about letting his palm crackle, but decided against it. Deku was a lot of things. But right now, he was comfortable.

'That's right,' he said 'The only one dying around here will be you.'

Deku hummed to himself, looking stupidly comforted by this. But then Katsuki had always known he was a head-case and a half.

'Mmmmm. I don't want you 'better', Kacchan. I want you safe.'

Huh, what a coincidence. Because Katsuki wanted Deku to be…well. Not dead was a good start. He's see how things went from there.

'Worry about yourself,' he warned finally. 'You'll never be safe, neither you or your dream; not while I'm around.'

Deku turned his head, trying to hide his smile; Katsuki saw it anyway wrapping its way round his face and peeking out over one side. 'Mmm. But I'll get 'better' too Kacchan, just watch.'

That was the problem. Katsuki _had_ been watching. For too long, probably. He couldn't even summon the energy to grumble as tentatively, Deku's hands reached in and began exploring his scalp again, stroking through each stray fleck of yellow. He'd let Deku do as he liked, either way. Wasn't as though he had ever been stop the idiot in the first place.

It annoyed Katsuki. Made him want to hurl. Hopefully one day, he thought, all the fucking agro would be worth it.

'Tell anyone about this and I'll kill you,' he muttered. And pretended not to see Deku smile again.


	2. But it's All Still Up in the Air

**Day 4** (19/9) - Rise - Havoc - Amusement Park

* * *

Katsuki was mad. He was furious.

Because Deku's fingers in his hair felt stupidly, sinfully good. They were clumsy, sure, and sometimes a little uncertain as they wavered over his ears, but on the whole they managed to take up a careful rhythm, pulling themselves along the strands with a gentle brushing motion that rose and fell like waves against a seashore. And Katsuki could deal with that. That was _fine._ For Deku didn't yank at them, the way Katsuki would have been tempted to do in other circumstances, had their positions been reversed…but he wasn't stupidly timid about it either. No, his touches, as they repeated themselves, over and over, were hypnotic. At one time, Katsuki couldn't have imagined letting himself play into Deku's hands like this, couldn't ever have thought he would have been capable of allowing Deku any sort of power over him.

And yet here they were.

And of course, Deku had to ruin it all by speaking.

'Hey,' he said all of a sudden, hands coming to a stop in Katsuki's hair, like they belonged there or some shit. 'Kacchan...I was wondering...you don't have to say yes...'

'Spit it out, bastard.'

'Right...well, I kind of promised Gentle-san-'

San? SAN! Katsuki could feel his brow twitch, the wrinkle screwing up into an unpleasant fissure in his skin. Deku sure found some weirdos to look up to, huh...

'He asked me to take his friend on a trip somewhere, just for fun! Um, I guess I sort of told you about her…La Brava?'

And that's when the fury started. Katsuki's eyes snapped open. He could feel a growl beginning to emerge from his throat like a roar. And Deku immediately tensed, hands flying off his scalp as though Katsuki was a burning pot, full of boiling water about to sizzle and steam its way into his face.

'Ah! But I understand if you don't want to! I guess I got carried away! There's no way Kacchan would enjoy something like this, right? I mean you never want to go shopping with the rest of the class, and you value your personal time without everyone overcrowding you-'

'Deku.'

Izuku froze, not just at his voice, but because Katsuki's hand had reached out and snagged his wrist before the failing hand attached to it could knock his precious 'Kacchan' in the face. Captured, it now hung heavily in the ring Katsuki's fingers and thumb formed, the thin strips and scars that littered it riding into the delicate tips and bends of those same fingers twisted around it. Katsuki scowled automatically, reminded a little too much of the night he had pinned Deku to the ground, and squished that same wrist within his grasp. With a huff, he let go.

'Oi,' he said roughly. 'Where the hell are you taking this love freak?'

A heavy scowl came down to rest on Izuku's face at that. 'Kacchan! That's rude! There's no way I could let the two of you meet if you-' Then he stopped, his brain dragged to a halt as it worked out the meaning behind Katsuki's question.

Katsuki, for his part, grit his teeth, and tried not to yell. Honestly, why the hell else would he ask where Deku was taking someone who probably wanted to see him roll over and die, if he wasn't planning on tagging along too?

'Kacchan, you-!' Deku looked down at Katsuki, a complicated look on his face.

Then, gently, far, far too gently for Katsuki's liking, Deku's fingers came curving back into his hair, around his head – and gingerly lifted said head off the other boy's lap and onto the bed. Katsuki's head sank into the sheets for a moment, too shocked to do anything. And then his wits caught at him, and he reared up, turning round to lunge at Deku's unsmiling face.

'Oi, where do you get off treating me like a piece of trash you can dump off anywhere you feel like it, huh? You're the one who asked me to come along, damn it!'

'I know,' said Deku, far too smoothly for his own good, the bastard. 'But I made a promise to Gentle-san. I don't want to break it, just because…' he flinched and looked to the side, and oh hell, no, that wishy-washy behaviour was _not_ gonna fly.

Katsuki leaned in close, his mouth snarling out a breath of air across Deku's face. 'Look at me when I'm talking. What the hell's wrong with you?'

Because Deku's eyes had glazed over, as though lost in a memory. And he looked…almost distressed. 'Sorry Kaccchan. I seem to have fallen into a pattern with you. I keep sharing promises with you that I should really keep to myself. It's why I can't ask anyone else in the class; I didn't tell them anything. But you…'

His mouth created that awkward wibbly line it sometimes did when he felt as though he should be chastised for something.

'But with me you spill your guts like a fish,' Katsuki said dully. It astonished him sometimes, how although Deku had grown and changed from when he was a weak, crybaby four year old, some behavioural traits still remained ingrained within his psyche. 'How are you still alive?'

Izuku scowled again. 'I'm sorry I asked you, Kacchan. Forget it; I'll be fine.'

Katsuki scowled back. 'Huh? You're just going to stroll round Disneyworld, arm in arm with someone who blames you for that Gentle criminal getting locked away?'

Okay, now Deku was actually looking worried. _Good_. He should be. He wouldn't be going out for a simple picnic, after all.

But no, Katsuki was being the stupid one here; because Deku was wearing that obstinate look he got, the one where he refused to be a pebble on the side of the road, and instead transformed into a huge boulder ready to roll rampantly over everything. _Goddamn._

'Someone should do something,' that boulder now said insistently. 'And I know you meant that as something to mock with me with…but going to an amusement park wouldn't be such a bad idea.'

Wow. Katsuki was going to punch him for real in a minute. Instead he raised his twitching fist and thumped it into the top of the bed, a vein throbbing violently in his forehead.

'Damn Deku. You still won't listen to a damn word I say, huh?'

Deku actually looked a bit cross at that. 'Kacchan…I do listen…but I'm not just your dog you can make obey.'

Katsuki growled. Made a few swift calculations in his head. 'You're going to get a teacher's permission for this, if you haven't already,' he said threateningly. 'Otherwise I'll nark on you, you see if I don't. And this La Brava psycho is even shorter than you, right? Grape-head size? So you should stick to parks designed for squealing girl brats, the ones with sparkly pink stuff. Nothing dramatic,-' and here he shot a quick look at Deku to gauge the other's interest. And the shit nerd was watching him, wide eyes, and with a look of hopeful awe in their excited green glimmer. Even his hands were excitedly clutching at his sheets. Katsuki snorted, and rode on the wave of dim pleasure and frustration the expression gave him. Deku was an idiot for offering it up in the first place so freely. 'And nothing All Might or hero -themed either,' he adding, shooting a cruelly triumphant leer in Deku's direction.

It was worth it, just to see the almost comical look on Deku's face as it fell.

* * *

Katsuki was darkly wondering to himself if this was all worth it. Sure, the chances of Deku getting himself in real trouble from an outing like this were…low. He wasn't a weak pushover, not anymore. On the other hand, the whole situation had arisen from his gullible I-can't-stand-to-see-anyone-else-be-upset thing he had going on. That Gentle fellow had probably looked at Deku through that thick panel of prison glass in the visiting room, let a few theatrical and clearly fake tears dribble down his face, and that damn Deku, like the bleeding heart he was, had lapped it all up.

Or so Katsuki told himself.

There was no other reason for him to be here. Nope, none at all. So grumbling to himself all the way, he trudged silently at Deku's side like a dark raincloud to a run-down apartment. It rankled at him, that he couldn't lean forward, break the pace into something faster, even if just to draw a little further ahead. But Deku knew the way better than him, having 'scoped it out beforehand.'

To which Katsuki had offered him a disgusted look. 'Wow,' he had drawled. 'Nice to see your gross stalker habits extent to all the non 'amazing' people out there as well.'

It was a clear barb, aimed precisely at Deku's past ravings about Katsuki and all he learnt through watching him, and Deku seemed to flare up a little at the comment. Mouth set in a firm line, he glared at the sidewalk, then frowned up at Katsuki.

'We have to be prepared, Kacchan. There's nothing wrong with that. Besides, didn't you say that you were going to make 'everything your own' too, in the same way I've done?'

He stared at Katsuki, level-faced and with determination shimmering out from every pore. It made Katsuki want to crush him. Instead he sneered back at him.

'Hah? And who said I needed to pick up any creepy stalker habits to do that?'

Deku looked down and stared fiercely at a stone perched on the corner of the pavement. 'Oh, we're here, Kacchan,' he said suddenly with fake cheer, before bounding up the rusted iron steps of what looked to be a makeshift fire escape, which was, apparently, the only clear pathway to apartment 2B. Katsuki stared after him in a bored fashion, hands lodged in his pockets. Then, shoulders hunched, he swaggered up after Deku, who was already smartly rapping on the door.

'La Brava? It's me, Deku! You should have got a letter from the prison your friend was at? He asked me to take you out.'

There was no reply.

Deku frowned and rapped a little harder. 'Hello? Hello! Anyone in there?'

Quick as lighting, a window slammed open, a garden hose rapidly slipping and coiling over the sill like a snake with a heavy head. La Brava's small head then peeked over the chipped paint of said sill a moment later, glaring fiercely as she announced: 'THIS IS FOR GENTLE!'

Training kicked in for Deku as he moved, while instinct and something more make Katsuki's hand flash out, ready to divide the hose into a series of ashy stumps. Out his leg flung at the same time, ready to rap La Brava in the head through the thin gap the open window provided. But Deku was already twirling, his own leg rolling round into a smooth kick – only for Katsuki to realise with a shock and a quick, searing sense of anger, that it was meant for him, rather than la Brava.

'WHAT ARE YOU PLAYING AT YOU DAMN DEKU!' he screamed as their ankles crossed in heavy slams of pain, both of them rearing away from the other and fumbling to keep their balance. Katsuki smoothly bounced off the iron railing his hand encountered, ready to clip the little pink gnome before him with a fist, while Deku raced forward yet again, determination on his face as he looked set to interfere with Katsuki for all the wrong reasons.

Meanwhile La Brava aimed the hose at Deku with steely grit in her eyes and Deku…made no move to get out of the way.

'OUTTA THE WAY!' Katsuki screamed, panic tingeing his vocal cords though afterwards, he would swear otherwise, if even to himself.

La Brava's eyes narrowed as the nozzle in her hand let out a click, before a long unsteady stream of hundreds of tiny pink paper hearts came rushing out to pelt Deku in the side.

Katsuki blinked and skidded to a stop. Deku did the same, chest heaving at the effect, glaring up at him, body lowered into a crouch as he fought to stabilise himself. And on and on it went, tiny pink paper hearts littering the side of his face, raining down into the crinkles and crevices of his lame t-shirt, becoming tucked in the loose knots of his hair. Deku took a breath, stood up, and Katsuki twitched at the weird confetti and the way it sprinkled over him like some pathetic imitation of the cherry blossoms that swirled through the streets in April.

Uraraka, he thought grimly, would have loved this shit. Would have got all embarrassed and pouty-faced over a Deku smothered with love-hearts. Not him though.

Deku sighed. 'La Brava,' he said gently, love-hearts still falling down from around his ears. 'I'm not sorry I did my job. But I am sorry that it hurt you.'

Katsuki worked hard to hold down a snort. Because Deku actually meant that shit. And well. Because the pink midget was still glaring up at Deku balefully, freaking tears of her own bubbling up inside her eyes.

'Why?' she choked, ramming her fist against the window sill. ' _Why, why, why!_ ' Down her fist came each time, pounding into the frame with frustration. 'Why would Gentle ask _you_ to come see me?!'

Izuku sighed. 'He told me he didn't want you to go back to how you were. Before you met him you were very lonely, right? He doesn't want you to stay shut up in a house all day.'

She stared at him a moment. Reached up with both hands to grip the window sill. And then tumbled out of it, headfirst.

'Ah!' Deku was all panicked flustering and reaching out arms, babbling his typical 'are you alrights' as he propped her up against the side of her own crap-sack of an apartment. It was sickening. Even more so to see La Brava stare back at him woodenly in response.

'If Gentle wants this, then I'll do it,' she declared stoutly, amid all Deku's panicking. 'But I'm not happy about it.' And then, as though to give her ominous statement further weight, she kicked Deku in the shin.

And Katsuki? Katsuki had to work even harder to hold his grin down at Deku's disgruntle face because of it.

* * *

La Brava's face, however, could not rub itself free of all expression. She failed to prevent the widening of her eyes, or her drawn-in breath as they walked her into a wide, almost conical building and directed her down some steps. Beneath, lay an underground pathway littered with yellow bricks, all with rainbows and a blue mural of the sky decorating the walls to accompany it. They bulldozed straight past it though, Katsuki keeping a careful eye on her all the time, even if his pretended gaze was directly focused on front of him at the candy stalls behind the ticket booths, and all the stupid cat-shaped helium balloons propped up in giant vases like flowers around them.

'Oh,' said La Brava quietly, as they walked through the fake streets beyond the booths, plastic white buildings at every steps.

'Oh,' she said again, at all the people in animal suits, and the ones with cat ears as part of their quirk, coming round to stumble round her.

'Oh,' she said for the third time, as Deku directed her onto a boat on an underground river with a smile. The water was lined with hundreds of fairy lights, the pinpricks of yellow melding together to form a deep bubbling gold beneath the icy blackness of the water, and Izuku turned to her with a gentle smile, his hand extending out to her, as though she were a lady he had to help onto a gondola. She looked at him for a moment, then stiffly, her arm rose, and Izuku's smile turned even sweeter as his fingers engulfed her hand entirely. With a step that barely made the boat bob, La Brava clambered inside.

Katsuki glared at the pink love-hearts stamped along the side of the white boat and those artistic curls, like the twirling ends of musical notes, that the wooden ends of the boats were arranged into. And then he stepped inside the structure as roughly as he could. He ignored the faint look of exasperation Izuku sent him as his feet set the boat rocking violently on the water, and quickly huddled in on himself as he slouched onto the seat. Just because he had decided to be here, didn't mean he was going to act like a prissy gentleman, the way Izuku seemed determined to be.

In fact…

He quickly leaned forward, allowing his breath to catch on Izuku's ear as he hissed: 'Quit acting! You're not fooling anybody! You think a little gesture is going to make her forget you helped take away the only person she gives a damn about?!' And then he leaned back, his cobra strike over with.

Izuku flinched, a grumpy look on his face before he tried to reset it and turned to offer a slight smile at La Brava. She looked at them both for a moment, a small calculation running behind her pupils that made Katsuki feel on edge, before she turned away.

They then drifted along in silence after that. Or at least, it would have been silent, if the theme park hadn't chosen to set speakers on every turn and bend of the fake stream they were on, all to pipe tweeny pop music over one of the most boring rides Katsuki had ever set foot on. He stared, stony-faced, as he watched more adults in furry suits skip around park benches and papier-mâché suns with smiley faces of what the fuck ever. He actually began tuning it all out after a while; the only thing he had room in his head for now, was La Brava, and making sure her anger or whatever else was going on in that screwed up head of hers, wasn't directed their way.

As it was, she was being very quiet. At least, until the sixth turn of the ride.

'Gentle once said we should go on something like this together,' she said, all as a large talking mushroom hopped past.

Deku looked at her with worry in his eyes in response, a soft hand skittering over her back as he bit his lip. _What should I do?_ His look seemed to say to Katsuki. _How can I help her?_

Katsuki growled to himself, and hunched down further into his seat, wanting nothing to do with that horror show. And even after the boat ride was over, and he was forced to un-hunch himself to get out of the thing, he kept his expression closed off and grumpy, all as Deku told them to wait while he got them ice cream.

'What's your favourite flavour?' he asked La Brava, gaze becoming strained as she directed the full force of her glare against him. 'Or, I, err, could get you something else?'

La Brava sniffed and let her glare fall, to soften and transform into a pitiful gaze as it skittered over the cobbles at her feet. 'Red bean, or Strawberry,' she muttered after a moment.

Deku offered her another small smile before turning to Katsuki. 'Ah…I know you're not a fan of sweet things, Kacchan, but if you want one…'

Katsuki looked at him, then offered him a razor sharp grin. 'Wasabi,' he practically purred, low and deep.

Deku worked hard to keep his annoyance down, though Katsuki wasn't fooled; he could see it bubbling away in those green eyes. 'I really don't think they'll have that flavour here, Kacchan,' he said levelly. 'Maybe some Green Tea? Or chocolate?'

Katsuki let his grin deepen. 'Too much for you to handle? You can't even manage to find one flavour of ice cream? What a surprise.'

But not to Katsuki. No, he had researched this place from top to bottom the night before, trawled though all the low-life blogs that recent visitors had mentioned the park on, and plucked his way through all the seedier forums that he knew Deku would be too much of a goody-two-shoes to pick his way through. So, yes, he _knew_ that was a place serving Wasabi flavour here. Whether Deku could manage to find it though, was another question.

But Deku still caught the taunt in his tone, as Katsuki suspected he might, and it made his back ram-rod straight. 'If it's there, I'll find it,' he promised, a slightly weary tone to his voice. Serving as a reminder that Izuku could read him better than most other people could. And that for all his flaws, Katsuki wouldn't really ask for the impossible. No, that was usually reserved for himself.

Katsuki leaned back against a wall and then proceeded to watch Deku nervously skitter round a talking tree and mechanical parrot, all to rush into the nearest vendor stall. For a moment, both he and La Brava were quiet.

Then:

'You planning on pulling any shit?' Katsuki asked, his eyes giving her a contemptuous sweep. Deku had given him the run down on her quirk; but without Gentle here, what was she but a glorified cheerleader without anyone to root for?

La Brava looked back at him steadily. 'Gentle doesn't want me to make trouble, so I won't,' she said softly. 'He likes Midoriya Izuku; and I can't hurt anything he likes.'

Katsuki stared at her. 'Huh,' he said. From the sound of it, she was allowing her feelings for Gentle rein in her real impulses. Unbelievable: she was actually _letting_ someone in prison effectively cage her in, and to Katsuki that sounded like a form of mental death.

La Brava glanced at him. 'I know you,' she said. 'From the Sports Festival. You were like someone possessed at the end. Why they imprison someone like my Gentle, and not you, I don't understand.'

Katsuki glared at her. 'What. Did. You. Say,' he gritted out. It wasn't a question, not really. He was used to this shit, after all. But it still rankled at him, that there were actual people out there, who thought he belonged in a place like the League of Villains.

But despite the sweltering rage inside him, the rage that he knew for sure must have been showing on his face, because it always did, and besides, that couple over there were actively cowering away from him, La Brava didn't flinch. No, she stared at him stonily.

'Nothing you do could possibly frighten me,' she informed him in a clipped tone of voice. 'I've already experienced my greatest fear; your people took my Gentle away from me.'

One part of Katsuki wanted to lower himself down to her, crouch in her face, bear his teeth and whisper 'good.' She and fucking Gentle would have closed down their festival after all and denied class 1A their chance to show the rest of the school what was up. But another part, a greater part, was strangely apathetic.

'So,' he drawled, deceptively slouching so he could be closer to her level. 'You won't take down Deku in return? No revenge? Not so long as your boyfriend tells you not to?' And quick as a whip, he let his body fall forwards, his eyes truly dipping down to her level in an intimidating loom. 'What a _good_ little girl you are!' He smiled, the line of his mouth happy and curved and oddly relaxed. 'Still though. Promises are cheap sometimes; that guy-' he jerked his head in the direction Deku had disappeared in – 'already broke one he shouldn't have done a while back. And I don't know you from shit. You might break your word, whenever. So let me make this clear, Miss Missing Valentine-' he let his nose graze the air scant centimeters from her forehead. 'Your quirk might not have been enough to keep this man you proclaim to love so much, safe. But against someone like you? _Mine will._ '

And I don't even like Deku the way you say you like this Gentle Wonderdrug, he thought as he stepped back and watched her look at him with wide eyes. Hurt swam in their depths, but Katsuki didn't care. He didn't know her from shit. But she _knew_ Deku enough to hate or dislike him, and while Katsuki didn't care for her reasons, what mattered was that Deku didn't fall over dead, all because he decided to trust a freaking villain he had helped take down, no matter how un-villain-like she might or might not have turned out to be.

Speaking of which…he saw Deku from the corner of his eye hurrying back and stepped forward, ready to seize his ice cream.

'This better burn off my tongue,' he warned. 'Or someone's dead.'

Deku looked at him with even wider eyes. And Katsuki shrugged. Licked. And closed his eyes in a grimace as the taste of sweet potato hit his tongue.

He pulled the cone slowly away from his mouth. Glared at it. Then gave Deku the stink-eye.

Deku shrugged.

'They'd sold out,' he said. 'Sorry, Kacchan.'

'Bullshit,' snarled Katsuki, marching up to the vendor he knew for a fact had wasab-

…There was a 'sold-out' sign plastered across the window.

Katsuki furiously took several large chunks out of the cone he held in his hand, and swallowed the rest of the ice cream with a savagery that had a little kid next to the litter bin eyeing him with fear.

La Brava too, was eying him, from above her Red Bean ice cream. But not with fear.

'Your boyfriend is frightening,' she told Deku with a solemnity that betrayed the disgust in her eyes.

Katsuki immediately began choking, as Deku started stammering and stumbling over his own tongue.

'B-b-boyfriend! N-NO! It's not, I mean, where did you get THAT idea from?! I mean, sure, I guess two guys coming to a place like this with it's cute, um, lovey-dovey theme might be unusual if they're not a couple…' his expression twisted in on itself as he fought through his reasoning. 'But! Ah! It's really not like that with Kacchan!'

La Brava blinked. 'Really? You have a very cutesy nickname for him.'

Deku seemed to startle at that, both hands wrapped firmly round his ice cream that he had barely taken two licks off. He cast an increasingly frantic look at Katsuki.

'That's…that's!'

'Oi,' Katsuki bit out, now that he was done dribbling on himself like a baby. 'Leave it alone, you pink freak. There are plenty of weirder names out there, and the people who get called them, don't go round fucking the ones who started it all off.'

Deku paused mid-stutter and _stared_ at him. Really stared. And then cocked his head to one side. What a creeper.

'OI!' Katsuki barked at him, mostly to get rid of the annoying hurt he felt bubbling up in his chest. 'WHAT ARE YOU STARING AT!'

Deku winced, his nose wrinkling up. 'I just…was expecting you to get angrier. That's all.'

Katsuki crushed the remainder of the cone in his fist. 'HUH?'

Deku started stuttering again. And this time when La Brava met Katsuki's eyes again, she was laughing at him.

* * *

After that mess was cleared up (except it wasn't, not really; but Katsuki didn't really want to muse too long on _that_ ) La Brava was a lot quieter. She kept pulling at her twin-tails, a gesture that had Deku frown worriedly at her once or twice, though she kept her gaze to the ground, away from them both. Eventually, Deku reached the end of his patience, and he bent down to look her in the eyes from around the mouthful of vanilla ice cream he was licking off his fingers (because Deku was a big baby at heart, whose taste-buds had never matured into anything decent) to ask her: 'what do you want to do next?'

Her gaze flickered from the ground to Deku, then back to Katsuki. Then she took a deep breath.

'The Big Wheel,' she said firmly. 'Let's try that one, next.'

* * *

Katsuki wasn't really surprised that they had hollowed out a cavern big enough to place one of those stupid big wheel things. He stared up at it dully, at all the white and red striped spokes that held the wheel together, designed to look like candy canes, even trailing his eyes down to witness the large love-heart stamped on the centre in obnoxious pink. Obnoxious because it clashed horribly with the bright scarlet swamping the spokes and leaking over onto the roofs of each carriage. His lip peeled back in disgust.

'Maybe you'd like to wait here, Kacchan?' Deku asked him, his keen eyes instantly picking out the gesture like the stalker he was.

Katsuki whirled round on him with a glare. 'The hell? You think I can't handle a damn ride?!'

That weary look was back in his eyes, and instead of replying, Izuku merely _sighed,_ and turned to stretch his eyes up to the top. 'Well, at least the carriages are big enough to fit six people inside, so I guess it'll be alright,' he muttered.

Katsuki twitched. What the hell was the nerd insinuating? That Katsuki took up more than enough room than a single person could? That he couldn't sit still in a carriage for fifteen minutes? Still, he settled for merely glaring at the back of Izuku's head. He'd show him.

Too bad there was nothing to really show off, apart from remaining still. Katsuki tried very hard to not show he was sulking, but there was nothing much else to do, apart from glare balefully through the glass, to the fake underground town below. It wasn't really an impressive sight.

Up and up they went, the awkward silence growing, and growing. So much so that La Brava whipped out a small laptop, bored look intact, and started drumming her fingers against the keyboard in an incessant pattern of clicking and small thumps. Katsuki watched her fingers dance over the small grey buttons, because quite frankly, it was more interesting than anything else that was happening.

And then, just as the ride reached the zenith of it's ascent, it shuddered. Jerked to a halt. And they were left faintly swinging in a carriage at the top.

Katsuki narrowed his eyes. And La Brava sighed, looking up from her laptop.

'In the letter Gentle sent me, he told me to forgive you, trust you even,' she said, the gaze she was shooting at Izuku so tired, that Katsuki tensed, a faint heat fizzing up from the centre of his palm. 'But I…I don't know if I can do that. I don't know if I should. It feels like a betrayal of Gentle to do that, even if I know that the real betrayal is to not do as he asks. To not even try.' Tears started to fleck her eyes.

Izuku looked at her, that awkward sad look of sympathy crossing his face that Katsuki absolutely hated.

'You haven't done anything else, right, La Brava?' he asked softly. 'You haven't hacked any other rides?'

A tear fell down her cheek. And she shook her head slowly, her twin-tails slithering behind her head at the motions, like wonky pendulums.

Deku sighed. 'I won't ask you to forgive me,' he said softly, and Katsuki glared at him. Because bullshit. What had Deku done wrong? Well, sure he should have got a teacher, told them his suspicions about Gentle rather than start a brawl in the street, that was stupid as fuck, _yeah_ , but he had still got the job done. He'd played his part. In a fight someone had to lose, and personally Katsuki would rather it be Deku who came out the victor, than some no-name who was universally mocked on Youtube.

'But I get it,' Deku continued. 'You told me Gentle, was your light, once?' He looked away. 'I also have someone like that, who inspired me. And then I had to watch them leave, be taken away from doing something that they loved. They're not confined in the same way Gentle is, but it wouldn't surprise me if he felt he was in a kind of prison too.'

Katsuki stiffened as Deku deliberately failed to look at him, fingers twisting into his arms as he crossed them, as though trying to find relief in the small pinpricks of pain that were probably radiating up from all the spots his blunt nails dug in.

All Might, he thought dully. There was no way Deku wasn't talking about All Might.

Deku smiled, more to himself than anyone else and turned to face La Brava again. 'I couldn't forgive the person who did that to them, either. So I think you're perfectly right to feel the way you do.'

Katsuki's breath froze in his throat.

Deku's eyes flicked to him and Katsuki hated the feel of them on him,all the sympathy and the kindness and the analytical focus in their sweep.

'I haven't forgiven the person who took away something so precious to them. Thankfully he's locked up now.'

And Katsuki's breath stuttered between his teeth. Deku wasn't talking about him, even though Katsuki felt as though he should have been. He was referring to All For One, the bastard who fucked over Ragdoll and might well have fucked over Katsuki if things had turned out differently.

'But you don't have that with me.' Deku took a breath, then bowed his head low, to La Brava. Katsuki had the hysterical urge to seize it by its unruly green locks and yank it back up again. 'I'm sorry. And I think you should be honest with Gentle, and tell him how you feel.'

La Brava stared at him some more. Then with the tears falling off her cheeks and plopping onto her keyboard, she sniffed. And began to type again.

Within seconds, there was a whirling clank. And the ride began to move.

Katsuki stared at Deku. Even now there was still a single tiny pink paper love-heart caught in his hair, trapped against the side of his neck. Unbidden, he reached out and roughly brushed it away, earning a startled look from the nerd at his touch.

Katsuki glared at him, hard. 'Don't apologise for doing the damn job you chose to take up,' he growled. And then firmly turned his head away.

* * *

La Brava didn't cause any more trouble for them. Her look, as they walked her back home, was pensive, and troubled. Just as Deku's was, as Katsuki walked back with him to the dorm.

'You tryin' to make her all 'better' too?' Katsuki asked suddenly.

Deku whirled round to look at him, startled. And then he sighed. 'I think only Gentle can do that. It's not like he'll have to serve a lot of time anyway. His crimes were relatively minor.'

Katsuki snorted. 'You worry about all the wrong losers. All the people who don't need you trailing after them, crying.'

Deku shot him a wry look at that. 'I can't help it, Kacchan. I just don't like seeing people get hurt.'

Katsuki snorted again. And knocked against Deku's shoulder with his own. It was worth it, to see the startled joy rush into Deku's expression at the gesture. Hopefully it would shake a few of those worrywart brain cells in his head loose too.

* * *

Katsuki had a lot to think about most days. That night, he thought of La Brava and Gentle, and how Deku had described their fight together back at the festival. Difficult, he'd said. Exciting. Almost unstoppable.

Katsuki growled and let a little heat flare to life in his palm. He watched it crackle, shoving orange heat into his room, casting shadows and flickers of lava-light light across the darkened stretch of his ceiling. He and Deku could probably manage better than a pair of half-baked criminals. He wasn't sure if he really liked the idea of teaming up with the nerd just yet though; wasn't sure if either of them had earned it.

He fixed a fierce grin in place at the thought. Because what did it matter if they hadn't earnt it _yet_. The point was that they _would_. No question about that. He didn't condone _trying_. Not if it meant there would no eventual succeeding in the end.

You'd better watch it, Deku, he thought. If you're not ready, you'll never catch up.

* * *

Which had no bearing on the fact he found himself with his head on Deku's lap a few days later. Deku looked at him, green eyes all lit up with concern as he pressed another ice pack to Katsuki's cheek.

Katsuki grimaced and tried not to feel as though he's coughed up a tooth.

'Damn rabbit woman,' he choked out, trying not to focus on the heat and slide of Deku's hand as it patted the side of his head daringly. Nor on the harsh jut of the leg armor pressed up under his neck, now that Deku had slide the metal brace of his own neck costume loose. 'I'll get her next time.'

Miruko, from where she'd been watching on the sidelines of the gym bit out a harsh cackle. 'Try it, Sparky. I'll be using your hair as my new mop, see if I don't. If it's fine enough for your little boyfriend to run his hands through-' and here she waited with a knowing grin for Deku to squeal like a pig and lift his hand away from Katsuki's spikes, a thousand jabbering apologies on his tongue – and yeah, Katsuki couldn't help but glare at her for that – 'well, then. It's more than fine enough to sweep up all the tears and spilled blood on this floor.'

Deku's eyes went wide. 'Blood,' he echoed in horror.

Katsuki aimed a bored look in his direction. 'Stop being such a wimp,' he bit out, already struggling to his hands, Deku's own palms hovering uselessly around him, as though waiting for him to inevitably fall. Katsuki swallowed down the anger that rose up in him at the sight; Deku wasn't doing it to be patronising, he knew that now. But it still stung, rankled in him to the core. Deku had always found that aspect of being a hero so easy, while Katsuki found it harder than swallowing pins.

His aimed another glare at the damn smug Rabbit woman. 'You wanna go? How about taking us both on. If Hero Duos, or groups, or whatever, are as pitiful as you say they are, you should have no trouble kicking us both to the ground, right?' He gave her a toothy grin. 'You _pro._ '

At his side, Deku squeaked. But, Katsuki noted, he didn't look too unexcited at the thought. And he wasn't completely losing his shit about the boyfriend comment and sputtering a thousand useless denials over it the way he had the other day.

Katsuki shoved down the annoying smugness he felt at the idea. Neither of them were ready for that; hell, he still felt an annoying urge to throttle Deku more days than not. And Deku, for all that he was a shit-stain, deserved something better than what Katsuki was now.

Still he couldn't resist one final jab at the idea of it.

He turned his toothy grin on Deku. 'C'mon Sweetheart,' he crooned, mockery in every bite of the word. 'You up for this? Or do I have to break her down with your corpse?'

Deku gave him a nasty glare for that. And Katsuki's grin widened as Deku clambered to his feel, grit and determination written into every line of his face.

That, no _, this,_ he could work with.

He turned to Miruko. Grinned. Then flung himself forward.


End file.
